jetpack_monkey: (Number 6 - Can You Hear Me Now?)
Movies I've seen before are in italics.

Rifftrax: Night of the Shorts - SF Sketchfest 2015
Rifttrax Live: MST3K Reunion
Cruel Gun Story (1964)
Locked Down (2021)

Not a lot this week. Cruel Gun Story is a Japanese noir, part of a series on Criterion Channel. It's a pretty good heist-plus-double-cross movie.

I enjoyed Locked Down, although I don't have a lot to say about it. Anne Hathaway is a delight.

jetpack_monkey: (Tom Servo Lives!)
Movies I've seen before are in italics.

She Done Him Wrong (1933)
MST3K: Prince of Space
MST3K: Parts the Clonus Horror
MST3K: The Mole People
Life of Brian (1979)
Rifftrax: Fun in Balloonland
Gojira (1954) (with David Kalat commentary)
Tenet (2020)

She Done Him Wrong is part of a collection of Cary Grant comedies on Criterion Channel (subscribe today!), but it's really Mae West's show. Everything thing she says is innuendo of one variety or another.

Tenet is kind of a brain scramble. I liked it! I'm pretty sure some of it doesn't hold up upon further reflection, but I'm trying to avoid that.

jetpack_monkey: (Joxer - Happy)
Hello friends! It's a Happy New Year! I spent a lot of time watching TV this last week. [personal profile] sol_se and I finished Batman (1966) Season 1, Skin Wars Season 2, and Lovecraft Country. We're also in the midst of Steven Universe.

Movies I've seen before are in italics.

Blazing Saddles (1974)
MST3K: Mr. B's Lost Shorts
Death to 2020 (2020)
Arsenic and Old Lace (1944)

jetpack_monkey: (Default)
Working through some Christmas-y movies with [personal profile] sol_se for the most part.

Movies I've seen before are in italics.

It's a Wonderful Life (1946)
What We Left Behind: Looking Back at Star Trek Deep Space 9 (2019)
MST3K: Santa Claus Conquers the Martians
A Muppet Christmas Carol (1992)
Bell Book and Candle (1958)
The Howling (1981)
WW84 (2020)

I cried like a baby at the end of IaWL once again. Never fails.

The DS9 doc was weird, but ultimately enjoyable. I thought it was a little odd that it was put together by the show runner, though.

I stand by my assertion that A Muppet Christmas Carol is a top-tier Dickens adaptation and Michael Caine is one of the best Scrooges.

Bell Book and Candle starts on Christmas Eve, so it counts. It's that other film about Jimmy Stewart's obsessive love for Kim Novak.

[personal profile] sol_se bought me The Howling on Blu-ray for Christmas (as well as the special edition of Curse of Frankenstein) because she loves me and wants me to be happy. Still a great movie. Very formative for teenage me.

I think I liked WW84? They spent more time on the emotional beats for Maxwell Lord than they did for Diana, which is an odd choice. There's nothing to approach the battlefield scene in the first one. I think this is probably one that's going to get worse in my mind as time goes on, but for the 2.5 hours it was playing, it kept my attention.

jetpack_monkey: (Henry Frankenstein - l33t g33k)
We have a tree! It's very pretty.

Movies I've seen before are in italics

MST3K: The Magic Voyage of Sinbad
MST3K: Viking Women vs. the Sea Serpent
MST3K: Samson vs. the Vampire Women

Jingle Jangle (2020)
White Christmas (1954)
Die Hard (1988)
Rifftrax Christmas Shorts-travaganza


My schedule after work has been a little cramped, so I've been taking to watching one half of an MST3K episode at night and then the rest in the morning while [personal profile] sol_se is at work.

We're working our way through a list of Christmas and Christmas-related movies. Jingle Jangle is marvelous. It's energetic and fun and made me tear up a couple of times.

White Christmas is a staple for me, but watching it with someone else made me see all of the flaws. Also, Bing Crosby was a reprehensible human being.

Yes, Die Hard is a Christmas movie, fight me. Actually, don't. However you feel about it is valid.

jetpack_monkey: (Default)
It was Turkey week!

Movies I've seen before are in italics

The Black Cat (1934)
Addams Family Values (1993)
MST3K: Carnival Magic

Village of the Damned (1960)
MST3K: Night of the Blood Beast
Jason X (2002)
Freddy vs. Jason (2003)

The Final Girls (2015)

Thursday for Thanksgiving, [personal profile] sol_se and I alternated between the MST3K Turkey Day marathon and movies.

We finally finished the Friday the 13th series, on a relative high note. Jason X is as fun and stupid as I remember it being and Freddy vs. Jason is probably one of the better films in the series (although admittedly, it's really a Nightmare on Elm Street film featuring Jason).

To cap that off, we watched The Final Girls. If you'd told me that morning that I would be crying to a woman doing a striptease to Bette Davis Eyes, I would've told you that you were clearly mistaken. Oh more fool me.
jetpack_monkey: (Default)
Sorry I missed last week. Work was crazy busy to start the week off and then by the time it calmed down, it felt too late. So we're covering two weeks today.

I've mostly been playing Assassin's Creed: Odyssey (although I've kind of quit due to some disappointing forced plot elements). [personal profile] sol_se and I have finished Star Trek Season 2, but are kind of on a break from the show accidentally. We're trying to watch a horror film per day in October, although I think it will be more like we will watch a horror film for each day in October. So, some days may have no movies, but there will be 31 total by the end of the month.

Movies I've seen before are in italics.

Lured (1947)
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953)

Enola Holmes (2020)
Star Trek III: The Search for Spock (1984)
The Vampire Lovers (1970)
Black Sabbath (1963)
MST3K: Pod People
Re-Animator (1985)
Bride of Re-Animator (1990)
Beyond Re-Animator (2003)

So Lured is early Douglas Sirk, stars Lucille Ball and George Motherf**king Sanders, with highish billing for Boris Karloff. It was okay. The plot didn't make a lot of sense, it had that weird thing where people who barely know each other get engaged, and Boris Karloff isn't throughout the film, just in one little bit.

In a turnabout of the way things usually are, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes is a classic Hollywood film that [personal profile] sol_se had seen but that I had not. It's a lot of fun. Marilyn Monroe is a comic genius, frankly, and Jane Russell is extremely horny throughout the film.

Enola Holmes is pretty good. I did not care for the compulsory heterosexual agenda, but Millie Bobby Brown is an engaging lead. I've also come around to being pro-Henry Cavill, his take on Superman aside.

Not much to say about Star Trek III except that Uhura got sidelined and I do not stand for that.

Sol_se loves a good lesbian vampire film and The Vampire Lovers is definitely in that category. Ingrid Pitt makes for a very seductive vampire. Plus Peter Cushing can never be a bad thing.

We watched the first episode of Monsterland and found it somewhat disappointing. It's definitely good, but also very depressing. It's not the spooky stuff that the trailers intimated. To get to a properly spooky place again, we watched Black Sabbath, a trilogy of terrifying tales from Mario Bava. It definitely did the trick.

I finally showed sol_se Re-Animator after talking it up for some time. She loved it and we immediately set about watching both sequels, one of which I had not seen. The quality of the series generally declines, but all three films are enjoyable to one extent or another.

jetpack_monkey: (Dungeon Master)
Spent most of the week playing Fallout: New Vegas and watching Star Trek: TOS.

Movies I've seen before are in italics.

MST3K: Cry Wilderness
The Magnificent Ambersons (1942)
Duck Soup (1933)

Cry Wilderness is up there for me in terms of best MST3K episodes ever, way up with Manos: The Hands of Fate, Pod People, and Puma Man.

I really enjoyed The Magnificent Ambersons, even with all the studio meddling. Orson Welles knows how to craft a narrative.

I showed Duck Soup to [personal profile] sol_se and she did not care for it. I still love it, but I also see how it's probably not everybody's particular cup of tea. Still, sol_se had the gall to say the Marx Brothers were on par with the Three Stooges! How very dare.

jetpack_monkey: (Tom Servo Lives!)
It's been quite a week! [personal profile] sol_se registered her car in California. We put together an exercise bike she got for her early birthday. I watched the John Wick movies for the first time. We also finished Avatar: The Last Airbender (so good!).

Movies I've seen before are in italics.

Hamilton (2020)
MST3K: Manos the Hands of Fate

The Third Man (1949)
Zodiac (2007)
John Wick (2014)
John Wick: Chapter 2 (2017)
John Wick: Chapter 3 (2019)

I watched Hamilton a second time while bored at work. So good. Cried again.

[personal profile] sol_se had never seen Manos, so that had to happen. So bizarre, so uncomfortable, such a rich tapestry of riffing.

I didn't feel like watching more Legend of Korra (I'm having a hard time finding an "in" for the series, but I also struggled with Season 1 of Avatar), so we switched to what may be my favorite film of all time, The Third Man. I picked up a new detail this time: Alida Valli's character is wearing pajamas monogrammed HL -- Harry Lime.

After watching a docuseries on the Zodiac Killer, sol_se was in the mood to watch David Fincher's Zodiac, which i had never seen. It's a very good movie, although I found myself frustrated with Jake Gyllenhaal's character frequently.

Continuing the trend of sol_se showing me cool stuff, we watched the whole John Wick series between Friday and Saturday. I liked them a lot, although I found the violence level to get more oppressive with each passing film. By the end of the third, which I liked a lot, I was hoping that there wouldn't be a fourth, because I'm not sure I could take it. My favorite of the three was probably the first.
jetpack_monkey: (Joxer - Happy)
Gamera is really neat / He is made of turtle meat / We all love you GAMERA!

Movies I've seen before are in italics.

MST3K: Gamera vs. Barugon
MST3K: Gamera vs. Gaos
MST3K: Gamera vs. Zigra

Gamera: Guardian of the Universe (1995)
Gamera 2: Attack of Legion (1996)
Gamera 3: Revenge of Iris (1999)
Gamera the Brave (2006)
Colossal (2016)

We were on a Gamera kick from the MST3K films and decided to watch the 1990s reboot. These films are bangers. They are so good. I didn't know what to expect, given the general low quality of the 1960/1970s Gamera films. The 90s films really take everything that works about Gamera, throw out everything else, and tell compelling giant monster stories.

Gamera the Brave is another attempt to reboot Gamera in a more kid-friendly fashion. It is... fine. It has some nice emotional moments, but otherwise doesn't leave much of an impression.

Colossal is dark. I both did and did not like it. I found myself pausing occasionally to give myself a break from how oppressive some of the plot points were. Still, a good movie.

jetpack_monkey: (Cary Grant - Crazy Moment)
[personal profile] sol_se is here! She arrived on Wednesday! She lives with me now! It's very exciting!

Movies I've seen before are in italics.

Ocean's 11 (1960)
Donald Glover: Weirdo (2012)
The Muppet Movie (1979)
The Avengers (2012)
partially w/[personal profile] sol_se 
Policy Story 2 (1988) partially w/[personal profile] sol_se 
MST3K: Gamera vs. Guiron w/[personal profile] sol_se 
Speed Racer (2008) w/[personal profile] sol_se 

I watched Ocean's 11 out of a dogged determination to watch more movies. I love a good heist movie! This is not a good heist movie. The heist itself is terrible, so the movie mostly coasts on Rat Pack swagger.

The Muppet Movie was something I watched while waiting for [personal profile] sol_se's plane to get in. Such a great film with tons of awesome celebrity cameos. I followed it up with the Gilda Radner episode of The Muppet Show, which was... fine..

I love The Avengers and it still holds up. Such a pure expression of a singular mash-all-the-action-figures together idea.

Criterion Channel has a collection of Jackie Chan movies right now and I'm enjoying that. I didn't get a chance to watch through all of his movies when I made I Don't Feel Like Dancin', so this seems like a good time to revisit. Police Story 2 is full of the kind of hijinks you would expect. Chan is really a comedian who has mastered use of environment for a laugh.

Sol_se wanted to watch one of the MST3K Gamera films, so I picked the one with the terrible dubbing, forgetting that it was also the one where Gamera does a gymnastic flip. Nice!

Speed Racer is the very first movie sol_se and I watched together when we were doing our virtual dates. So, to commemorate our moving in together, we watched it again. Still a delirious, candy-colored experience that's much better than it has any right to be.

jetpack_monkey: (Tom Servo Lives!)
Title: Bad
Song: Bad by Michael Jackson
Source: Mystery Science Theater 3000 (and related media)
Length: 3:29
Warnings: Physical triggers (e.g., epilepsy or migraine: strobe lights, bright lights, "stuttery" cuts between 2-3 stills)
Made for: Vividcon, a vidding convention that takes place every August in Chicago (this version differs slightly from the one shown there)

Summary: DEEP HURTING



Vimeo Password: pushthebutton


Download 33.2MB MP4 (right/ctrl-click and "Save link as...")

Notes: Yeah, this was going to happen eventually.

Thanks to [personal profile] laurashapiro for her insightful beta!

jetpack_monkey: (Tom Servo Lives!)
Is for you to back MST3K on Kickstarter for whatever amount works for you. Here's the pitch:


I need this, guys! NEED IT.

Also, never has this icon been more appropriate and more hopeful.



jetpack_monkey: (Tom Servo Lives!)
I'll try to keep the pre-amble short this year, because the requests themselves tell a story. This is a Festivids request list that is as much for my mom as it is for me, as we'll see in a second.

Mystery Science Theater 3000 )

Gamera (Shōwa series, 1965-1980) )


Rocky Jones, Space Ranger )

Ed Wood's Kelton Trilogy (Bride of the Monster / Plan 9 from Outer Space / Night of the Ghouls) )

Manos: The Hands of Fate )

Space Mutiny (1988) )

Danger: Diabolik (1968) )

As for music: go with your heart. Or your head. Or your spleen. Whatever you feel works best. Nothing is off limits.
jetpack_monkey: (Tom Servo Lives!)


It's been 25 years since Joel and the bots started riffing on KTMA in Minneapolis. After a year of that, they moved to cable and into our hearts.

My sense of humor is partially defined by the wacky hijinks of this show and I love it to pieces. Watch some tonight, won't you?
jetpack_monkey: (Tom Servo Lives!)
Did you know that Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett, and Mike Nelson -- in addition to continuing the MST3K tradition of mocking movies over at RiffTrax -- have formed a band? They're called the RiffTones! And they apparently compete in QuikStop Entertainment's Masters of Song Fu.

Click on their link to listen to their ode to cursing the moon for Kevin's drunken antics, Moonshine!

ETA: Ode to the Ballpoint (challenge is to start a dance craze)

(The Ballad of) Rufus Amos Adams (challenge is to use that title and write a country ballad)
jetpack_monkey: (Tom Servo Lives!)
MST3K 20th Anniversary Reunion panel pics

Slightly out of order, unfortunately. Also, Trace is next to Joel, but he's obscured by the podium, so I didn't really get any good shots of him until the very end.
jetpack_monkey: (Cap'n Jack - Trigger Happy)
Saturday

The Roomie left me her car to run errands, so that's pretty much what I did all day. First I stopped by Mom's to pick up some packages I had mailed there, including the Night of the Living Dead 40th Anniversary DVD with the Classic-Horror quote on the back cover. Mom was babysitting my niece, who ran over to give me a big hug. It was the cutest thing ever.

After that, I ran to the hardware store to pick up some materials for the Memorial Day Project. Then I spent more time and drove more miles than I'd like to admit trying to find sufficient Testors Metal Flake Ruby Red paint, as the Project requires it in large quantities.

Picked up the roomie from work, dropped her off at the gym. Instead of heading to the nearby Best Buy, I headed into Bookstar, which was a book store that I'd seen a billion times but never gone into. It looked chintzy from the outside and I'd always assumed it was a half-price used bookshop. Nope. It was a Barnes & Noble in everything but the sign on the front and the way the employees answered the phone. Even the little placards over the individual sections said "Barnes & Noble". I ended up spending *coughcough* on some books on digital photography, web design (I'm trying to get a more elegant look for Classic-Horror) and Final Cut Express.

Sunday

Programmed my new Universal Remote. The old one only really controlled my stereo receiver and my VCR. This one handles everything but the Playstation 3 (which can't be helped because it receives over Bluetooth). I did have to reprogram Every Single Key for the HD-DVD player, because while the box received the signal, it thought I was trying to control a Standard DVD player and would throw up a little message on the front display that said "HD-DVD" instead of, y'know, doing something.

Edited two reviews and one Masters biography. Started working on a new fanvid for Donna Noble set to Oingo Boingo's Just Another Day.

Went to the coffeehouse that night with The Roomie to finish up some other work.

Memorial Day

Woke up early, skipped breakfast and computer to go directly to beginning the Memorial Day Project: painting the pieces of what will eventually be my very own Tom Servo puppet. The Roommate gathered them about a year and a half ago as a Christmas present, but circumstances prevented her from putting it together. Now we've finally decided to tackle this as a team. I have high hopes for its completion before she leaves for vet school in three months.

The Roomie's boyfriend came over that night and we watched Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie, followed by Mystery Science Theater: Mr. B. Natural, then Cinematic Titanic: The Oozing Skull, and finally Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II. Good times were had by all.
jetpack_monkey: (Tom Servo Lives!)
There's a sweet interview with Kevin Murphy and Bill Corbett of Mystery Science Theater 3000 and The Film Crew over at Classic-Horror.com. I didn't conduct it, but I did take the photo near the end of the article.

It was so weird being in the same room with these guys, because they sound like mellow versions of Tom Servo (Murphy) and Crow T. Robot (Corbett). Appropriate, since they, y'know, played the 'bots but still very, very weird.

Anyway. Enjoy the interview.
jetpack_monkey: (Tegan - Why Me?)
The main problem with watching cheesy 1950s sci-fi flicks like "The Brain that Wouldn't Die" in the middle of a crowded coffeehouse is not, as one might think, the inane chit-chat intruding on the film's soundtrack. I have good headphones to block that out. No, the problem is that I have to keep my MST3K commentary to myself. I have half-a-dozen extremely wrong-headed comments to make to such classic lines as "Our bodies are capable of adjusting in ways we've hardly dreamt of" and if I say them outloud, I will likely be thought crazy.

*sigh*

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